


nothing's quite as sweet

by driedflowers



Category: Community (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, F/F, Getting Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-15
Updated: 2016-08-15
Packaged: 2018-08-08 23:23:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7777696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/driedflowers/pseuds/driedflowers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>“So, what’s a nonbeliever like you doing in NEWT Divination?” Britta asks.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	nothing's quite as sweet

**Author's Note:**

> Based on a prompt from [this post.](http://gayclaryfray.tumblr.com/post/124516693775/imagine-your-otp-hogwarts-edition%20) Tea leaf meanings are from [here](http://www.tasseography.com/stepone.htm%20).
> 
> Title from maple by hayley kiyoko

“So, what’s a nonbeliever like you doing in NEWT Divination?” Britta asks.

Annie can’t help but think she might have a point. This is time she could be spending studying, or doing homework, or practicing charms... But she’s felt a calling towards the foggiest of the magical arts lately, and her parents keep telling her that she should try to enjoy herself somewhat in school, not just cram in as many NEWT credits as possible. Thus, Divination.

“I just thought I’d try it out,” she answers, shrugging her shoulders. “Is anyone sitting here?”

Britta shakes her head and Annie sits down on the purple pouf next to her. She opens her mouth to try at some polite conversation, but Professor Trelawney interrupts her.

“Welcome back, class,” she intones from beneath even more shawls than last year. “I can say for certain that we have an exciting year before us. I see mystery, intrigue, and even romance in the future for your very classmates, perhaps even you.”

Annie hears several gasps at this, but she just feels like rolling her eyes. She doesn’t, though. There’s no point in being here if she’s not at least going to try to buy into it.

So, when they’re instructed to turn to the section on reading tea leaves in _Unfogging the Future_ , Annie swallows a smirk and gulps down her tea in a hurry. Across the table from her, Britta is sipping her own tea slowly, almost meditatively, flicking through the pages of the chapter. She’s so absorbed in her reading that it feels almost safe to stare at her. Her blond hair is ever-so-slightly curled (Annie knows she gets up fifteen minutes early every morning to do it; it’s totally worth it), and her forehead is scrunched up adorably in concentration. If Annie said any of this out loud, Britta would criticize her for being so superficial, for reducing a woman to her appearance. For comparing herself to someone else in order to decrease Annie’s own self confidence. Except, that is decidedly not why she’s looking at Britta.

Britta’s teacup clinks against the chipped saucer. “Do you want to go first?” she says.

“Yeah, okay,” Annie says, picking up her own cup. She swirls around the leaves a bit, and then looks at them hard, like she can force the dregs to coalesce into a discernible shape with the power of her mind. After a moment, she can kind of see something. “It looks like a bird?” she says.

“Okay, I’m gonna need some more specifics. An owl? A rooster? A _flock_ of birds?”

“It’s a swallow.” She doesn’t realize that’s what it is until the words leave her mouth. “What does that mean?”

“It says ‘love and new beginnings.’ Got your eye on a cute boy?” Britta sort of leers at her. It’s unsettling, but also weirdly attractive.

Annie scoffs. “Heteronormative much?”

“Hey, that’s my line,” Britta says. “Okay, got your eye on a cute _person_?”

“No. That can’t be right,” she answers hurriedly. She’s barely talked to any boys this year, let alone been interested in them. There is one person she’d like a beginning with, but it’s about as likely as Professor Trelawney seeing the winner of the Quidditch World Cup with her Inner Eye.

She swirls the cup again, squinting at the leaves. “Okay, what about a daisy?”

Britta flips to the next page before answering, taking time to read the little paragraph under the heading. “New love.”

Annie picks up her cup again, but Britta catches her eye. “The leaves don’t lie, Annie. I know you don’t believe in this, but women have an amazing connection with the art of Divination. You just have to listen to your Inner Eye, you could be a real seer.” Annie holds her gaze for a moment and imagines what it would be like to give in. To set aside logic and gasp in awe at Professor Trelawney’s proclamations like the rest of her class, or to set aside reason and do something rash. To kiss Britta across the table in the middle of class.

Annie’s eyes dart away, and so does her resolve to grow a spine. She gives a tiny shake of her head and swirls her tea leaves one more time. A heart. That won’t do.

Again. A rose.

She can feel a blush creeping across her cheeks, so Annie sets down her teacup and picks up her book, hiding behind it. “Why don’t you go?” she says, already flipping to the right page.

“Okay, what’s it say for a frog?”

_Fertility; abundance; a disguised handsome/beautiful lover,_ it reads.

“Abundance,” Annie says. “Something in your life will be really.... Abundant.”

Britta gives her a look like she knows something is up. But, it looks like Annie is getting away with it, because instead of opening her own book and outing Annie as a fraud and a liar, Britta looks back down at her tea leaves. “What about a gate?”

This one, she reads verbatim. “ _Be aware of opportunities around you_.”

“Geez, it’s almost like the universe is trying to tell us something, huh?” Britta grins and leans over to nudge Annie with her elbow. Annie doesn’t try to flinch away, but it happens anyway, and Britta’s face falls.

“Hey, I’m just following the leaves,” she says. “But okay. Message received.”

“No, it’s—” Annie is paralyzed. This moment isn’t going at all how she imagined. There is a glimmer of hope, but she doesn’t want to have this conversation here. Not in a stuffy attic filled with tacky ottomans, not across the room from where Anthony Goldstein is trying to balance a teacup on his head. But it’s kind of now or never, and she’s already been silent for too long, so she tries her hardest to shut it all out and _focus_.

“I wasn’t _bad_ surprised,” she says lamely.

Britta doesn’t answer, waiting for her to say more. Which is fair, seeing as she hasn’t really said anything to begin with.

Annie sighs at herself, and then, before she can change her mind, grabs Britta’s hand with both of her own. She looks down at her hands, and then up at Britta, who is grinning at her. Much like Divination, Britta is better at this whole romance thing than Annie is, and it’s infuriating.

“I, you,” she says, looking between them and hoping that will be enough.

“And you said the textbook was too vague.”

Annie laughs, and the crease in her forehead vanishes. This is Britta. Her friend. It’s going to be fine, no matter what. And hey, the tea leaves are on their side.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm on [tumblr](http://gayclaryfray.tumblr.com)! :3


End file.
